Why must intelligent design be stopped

[Kuciwalker]

That I got in university, in a history of science, that also taught the critiques his contemporaries levelled at the theory. Particularly for the materialist and reductionist consequences.

What's wrong with materialism or reductionism?

[Patroklos]

You must have gone to a ****ty school then, as I clearly remember the whole discussion about Origin of the Species, Darwin's observations that led to his theory, and a whole host of biological discoveries then and since then that have all supported evolution.

Darwin observed specalizatio, NOT evoluton. Darwin was wrong about a great many things.

And you're exactly wrong, in fact I've read of several recent experiments (actually read the papers) in the generation of artificial life, and the basic processes by which life originated are pretty well understood.

I am glad they are working on it, but it is you who are wrong if you think there is any broad concensus on that issue.

I would like a referance to the papers, though, not because I don't believe you. I think I would enjoy reading them

[Ben Kenobi]

Interesting, that, since we SKIPPED those people in physics and just started off with Newton's laws... also interesting that Kepler's laws are observed to be true and in fact can be derived from Newton's. The same cannot be said of ID and evolution.

Yeah, it is very interesting. It's a shame you skipped over Tycho, who was a real character. He made the observations that Kepler analysed to find the motions of the planets. From this, Kepler finally escaped the aristotelian notion of the circle being the most perfect form, by substituting ellipses for the orbits.

[Ben Kenobi]

What's wrong with materialism or reductionism?

Reductionism denies the existance of free will, while materialism, the influence of a spiritual world. In removing both from understanding people, I would think you lose a great deal of understanding why we are the way we are.

[Patroklos]

those are things that can be observed in action, and we can empirically say that they always work(The sun is going to come up tomorrow for example).

His playstation works because it works, its that simple .

Sure we could observe, but we can't observe or understand or reseach everthing. We believe in what is told to us by somone who has, and we believe him because we have faith it the system this particular soothsayer used to come to those conculsion.

And there are all sorts of observations in science that we have no clue about why such an observation can be made. Though we base things off that observation because we have faith our system will explain it one day.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


We also got taught, or at least I did, about how they derived the theory from observation. I don't recall them saying the same about evolution, other than that it was an indisputable fact.

The reason we teach the theory of gravity, is because we also get taught where it breaks down, and doesn't work so well. Why should evolution be any different?

A fact is a kind of theory.


Vocab lesson for Ben:

Hypothesis: an explaination for an observed natural process.

Theory: an hypothesis backed up by numerous experiements and/or observations.

Scientific Fact: a theory that has no legetimate rival theories and has never been contradicted by observation or experiemnt.



Darwinian Evolution is probably the most successful theory of all time (this title is often given to the Standard Model of physics, but Darwinian Evolution has been around longer and thierfore takes precidence )

[Odin]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Reductionism denies the existance of free will, while materialism, the influence of a spiritual world. In removing both from understanding people, I would think you lose a great deal of understanding why we are the way we are.

The first assertion is BS. The second assertion is also BS because you are assuming the existance of a spiritual world a priori just because the bible said so.

[Patroklos]

Darwin's theory has nothing to do with the modern theory besides the original observation.

Isn't gravity older, and there are all sorts of sciences that are much older than darwin. Darwin got to his islands through celestial navigation.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Patroklos
I am glad they are working on it, but it is you who are wrong if you think there is any broad concensus on that issue.

I would like a referance to the papers, though, not because I don't believe you. I think I would enjoy reading them

You can only access them if you have access to ProQuest Direct (to which I have through my school), but here are the links, titles and abstracts of the three specific ones I could recall and hunt down:

Experimental models of primitive cellular compartments: Encapsulation, growth, and division

Martin M Hanczyc, Shelly M Fujikawa, Jack W Szostak

Science. Washington: Oct 24, 2003. Vol. 302, Iss. 5645; pg. 618

http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=458287331&Fmt=null&clientId=7658&RQT=309&VName=PQD

The clay montmorillonite is known to catalyze the polymerization of RNA from activated ribonucleotides. Here we report that montmorillonite accelerates the spontaneous conversion of fatty acid micelles into vesicles. Clay particles often become encapsulated in these vesicles, thus providing a pathway for the prebiotic encapsulation of catalytically active surfaces within membrane vesicles. In addition, RNA adsorbed to clay can be encapsulated within vesicles. Once formed, such vesicles can grow by incorporating fatty acid supplied as micelles and can divide without dilution of their contents by extrusion through small pores. These processes mediate vesicle replication through cycles of growth and division. The formation, growth, and division of the earliest cells may have occurred in response to similar interactions with mineral particles and inputs of material and energy.



A Kinetic Study of the Growth of Fatty Acid Vesicles

Irene A Chen, Jack W Szostak

Biophysical Journal. New York: Aug 2004. Vol. 87, Iss. 2; pg. 988, 11 pgs

http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=681453911&sid=14&Fmt=4&clientId=7658&RQT=309&VName=PQD

Membrane vesicles composed of fatty acids can be made to grow and divide under laboratory conditions, and thus provide a model system relevant to the emergence of cellular life. Fatty acid vesicles grow spontaneously when alkaline micelles are added to buffered vesicles. To investigate the mechanism of this process, we used stopped-flow kinetics to analyze the dilution of non-exchanging FRET probes incorporated into preformed vesicles during growth. Oleate vesicle growth occurs in two phases (fast and slow), indicating two pathways for the incorporation of fatty acid into preformed vesicles. We propose that the fast phase, which is stoichiometrically limited by the preformed vesicles, results from the formation of a "shell" of fatty acid around a vesicle, followed by rapid transfer of this fatty acid into the preformed vesicle. The slower phase may result from incorporation of fatty acid which had been trapped in an intermediate state. We provide independent evidence for the rapid transformation of micelles into an aggregated intermediate form after transfer from high to low pH. Our results show that the most efficient incorporation of added oleate into oleic acid/oleate vesicles occurs under conditions that avoid a large transient increase in the micelle/vesicle ratio.



Structurally complex and highly active RNA ligases derived from random RNA sequences

Ekland, Eric H, Szostak, Jack W, Bartel, David P

Science. Washington: Jul 21, 1995. Vol. 269, Iss. 5222; pg. 364, 7 pgs

http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=6666475&sid=14&Fmt=3&clientId=7658&RQT=309&VName=PQD

Seven families of RNA ligases, previously isolated from random RNA sequences, fall into three classes on the basis of secondary structure and regiospecificity of ligation. Two of the three classes of ribozymes have been engineered to act as true enzymes.



This Szostak guy has actually done a lot of research in synthetic life and in the origins of life.

[Kuciwalker]

I picked those three because I presented on them in DNA science last year, not because they are necessarily the best examples in the field.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Patroklos


Darwin observed specalizatio, NOT evoluton. Darwin was wrong about a great many things.

I find it hilarious that many laypeople think biologists treat Darwin like a god. Darwinian Evolution has been confirmed by a truely enourmous amount of data, and has NEVER been contradicted, Evolutionary biology is more built upon the Modern Synthesis built by Mayr, Dobzansky, Haldane, G.G. Simpson, etc. and modern molecular biology than it does on darwin. Darwin. Darwin (and Wallace) mostly just gave us natural selection, the rest needed modern genetics. Darwin was to evolutionary biology to what Newton was to physics.

[Whoha]

Originally posted by Patroklos
Sure we could observe, but we can't observe or understand or reseach everthing. We believe in what is told to us by somone who has, and we believe him because we have faith it the system this particular soothsayer used to come to those conculsion.

And there are all sorts of observations in science that we have no clue about why such an observation can be made. Though we base things off that observation because we have faith our system will explain it one day.

I accept on faith evolution because the people that have done the work have done their homework. What I do know of support for evolution is primarily in the fossil record. It is in this record that one could easily disprove evolution, all you'd need to do is, for example, find a primate or Dinosaur before the first occurence of protista in the ground. Bonus points for style if you find it before what is accepted to be the phanerozoic era.

[Zevico]

one guy wrote a letter to the editor to a local paper that I read and he said evolution is wrong because it would be like a tornado going through a trailer park and assembling a 747

It'd be more like an infinite number of trailers coupled with an infinite number of trailer parks given an infinite amount of time to create a 747.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Patroklos
Darwin's theory has nothing to do with the modern theory besides the original observation.

Isn't gravity older, and there are all sorts of sciences that are much older than darwin. Darwin got to his islands through celestial navigation.

Newton explained what gravity DOES and the associated mathmatics and mechanics, he even admited he didn't know HOW gravity worked, that had to wait for Einstein.

[Patroklos]

I find it hilarious that many laypeople think biologists treat Darwin like a god. Darwinian Evolution has been confirmed by a truely enourmous amount of data, and has NEVER been contradicted, Evolutionary biology is more built upon the Modern Synthesis built by Mayr, Dobzansky, Haldane, G.G. Simpson, etc. and modern molecular biology than it does on darwin. Darwin. Darwin (and Wallace) mostly just gave us natural selection, the rest needed modern genetics. Darwin was to evolutionary biology to what Newton was to physics.

Interesting, as it is the science crowd that brings his name out like an idol. Though apparently we agree that Darwin was good only for his initial observation, which was not evolution.

Has anyone yet observed evolution? Not that that should kill the threory, but a fossil record is damn short of what most experiments require for observation as per the Scientific Method.